Charles Bradley

Charles Bradley

Charles Bradley is an American funk, soul and rhythm and blues singer from Gainesville, United States. He is associated with Daptone Records and with Charles Bradley & His Extraordinaires. Born in 1948 and dying in 2017, he is also known for performing under the alter ego Black Velvet.

Early life and formative years

Bradley is raised in Brooklyn, New York, and spends much of his childhood living on the streets. A formative moment comes in 1962, when his sister takes him to see James Brown at the Apollo. Brown’s performance leaves a lasting impression, and Bradley begins practising microphone routines with a broom tied to a string, copying Brown’s stage mannerisms.

He later leaves Brooklyn through Job Corps, a federal programme for underprivileged families. The placement sends him to Bar Harbor, Maine, where he learns to cook and puts together a band. He first performs for female Job Corps employees in Poland Springs, where the response convinces him that he wants to work as an entertainer.

Work as a chef and return to music

Bradley’s musical work is interrupted when his bandmates are drafted into the Vietnam War. He then works as a chef in Wassaic, New York, at a hospital for people with mental illness, cooking for 3,500 people a day for nine years. After that, he leaves Wassaic and travels west in search of work and a musical future, hitchhiking from New York to California and through Canada before reaching Alaska.

He spends more than 20 years in California, supporting himself as a chef while continuing to play music on the side. He does pick-up gigs and appears on recording sessions, but does not have a regular band. After being laid off from a job he has for 17 years, he returns to Bushwick, Brooklyn, with the musical equipment he has collected over the years. Back in New York, he works as a handyman so that he can keep pursuing music.

Daptone Records and recording career

Bradley begins to attract an audience in Brooklyn clubs with James Brown routines under the name Black Velvet. Gabriel Roth of Daptone Records sees him perform at the Tarheel Lounge in Bedstuy and brings him into Daptone’s House of Soul studios for a session with the Sugarman 3. His first Daptone single is “Take It as It Comes.”

Roth later introduces him to Dirt Rifle and the Bullets on Staten Island. Thomas Brenneck, the Bullets’ songwriter and guitarist, begins working with Bradley. They issue two singles on Daptone as Charles Bradley and the Bullets, before the band dissolves and Brenneck moves on to the Budos Band. Brenneck and Bradley later reconnect in Bushwick, and Bradley tells him the story of his brother’s death. Brenneck responds by suggesting that the story be turned into songs.

Brenneck develops instrumentals with Menahan Street Band, and the material becomes a fit for Bradley’s lyrics. Through Dunham Records, a division of Daptone, Bradley releases “The World (Is Going Up in Flames)” and “Heartaches and Pain” as the label’s second single. These recordings show a different side of Bradley from his earlier Black Velvet performances and establish him as a songwriter as well as a singer.

After years of collaboration, Bradley and Brenneck complete No Time for Dreaming, his first full-length album. He later tours with the Menahan Street Band and continues to develop as a singer and performer.

Death

Charles Bradley dies in 2017 from the consequences of cancer.